


Better keep your eyes on my every move

by heavenisalibrary



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-27
Updated: 2015-04-27
Packaged: 2018-03-21 18:28:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,473
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3701971
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heavenisalibrary/pseuds/heavenisalibrary
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It’s a holdover from her last regeneration, and he loves to remind her of it, because she regards it with the sort of distaste a middle-aged human would think of a tattoo they got when they were a teenager with, and it’s slightly hilarious. She’s so composed and unflappable otherwise, it brings him a childlike glee to point it out and watch her cross her arms over her chest and huff, muttering something about his fashion choices in previous regenerations.</p><p>Which is a fair point, of course. Previous regenerations dressed atrociously, in his current opinion, and River’s all but told him the bow tie won’t last past his current face, though he doesn’t really believe her. But for all of his bizarre sartorial choices, he’s never gotten anything <i>pierced</i>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Better keep your eyes on my every move

**Author's Note:**

  * For [goddessdel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/goddessdel/gifts).



> There's no real explanation for this. True to form, it's just PWP on a beach plus Ponds. Inspired by Sarah's Twelve/Mels fic and a conversation we had about River regenerating with Mels' belly-button ring.

It’s a holdover from her last regeneration, and he loves to remind her of it, because she regards it with the sort of distaste a middle-aged human would think of a tattoo they got when they were a teenager with, and it’s slightly hilarious. She’s so composed and unflappable otherwise, it brings him a childlike glee to point it out and watch her cross her arms over her chest and huff, muttering something about his fashion choices in previous regenerations.  
  
Which is a fair point, of course. Previous regenerations dressed atrociously, in his current opinion, and River’s all but told him the bow tie won’t last past his current face, though he doesn’t really believe her. But for all of his bizarre sartorial choices, he’s never gotten anything _pierced_.  
  
She tells him that she thought about it, when she’d been shot. She tells him that she’d thought about it quite a bit, trying to think of a way to get it out quickly, but then she’d been plotting an assassination and trying to keep her parents out of the way and also _dying_ not to mention wearing tights and a dress — so it had been all but impossible. So she’d regenerated around it, in the same way that she’d kept the clothes. The Doctor imagined it’d been much gaudier, when she was Mels. Probably she’d had a collection of brightly colored danglies and shining stones and all sorts of silly things — River never confirms nor denies it, just rolls her eyes and changes the subject.  
  
She _hates_ that belly button ring. But there’s really nothing she can do about it. If she takes the gold stud she usually keeps in it now out, there’s just a hole, and River’s always been quite concerned with her personal aesthetic. He really should stop taunting her, but it’s just _so_ funny that intrepid time traveler, rockstar archaeologist, deadly assassin and all-around larger than life River Song has her belly button pierced. The Doctor giggles even thinking about it.  
  
“You wore _celery_ ,” River says, one afternoon when he’s feeling particularly obnoxious. “You’ve no room to judge.”  
  
“It’s not the piercing itself,” the Doctor says, “it’s you _with_ it — tell me it’s not funny. Doctor Song, most feared being in some systems, and you’ve got a belly button ring. Like Britney Spears.” He giggles again.  
  
River glares at him, pulling a lever on the TARDIS console with a little more vigor than is strictly necessary. “How do you even _know_ Britney Spears?”  
  
“I know everything,” he says, straightening his bow tie. “How do you?”  
  
“Archaeologist,” she says, “anyway, you’d better not bring it up in front of the parents. They’re expecting a lovely little holiday with their daughter and son-in-law, and I’d rather not derail the day talking about the poor decisions I made in a past life.”  
  
“What’s in it for me?”  
  
“I won’t shoot you, that’s what,” River grumbles, shoving past him and exiting the TARDIS to pick up her parents. He hesitates a beat before following after her, trying to remember if he’d noticed a gun on her, but then, she’s fairly young, and so it isn’t like she gets dressed in front of him at this point. Well, from her point of view, she has, he thought, once or twice, but she’s still more than a bit skittish about the whole thing. He likes it better when she’s older and shameless, for other reasons, but partly because it lets him know if she’s armed. Sighing, he shoves his hands in his pockets and follows after her.  
  
  
  
Of course, he can’t let it be. Sometimes his brain just catches onto things and he can’t let them go, and so the moment the Ponds ask where they’re going, he can’t stop himself from blurting out —  
  
“The _beach_!”  
  
“ _Doctor_ ,” River says, in her most threatening tone of voice, and he quails slightly, pulling his hand back mid-nose bop and wheeling away around the consol.  
  
“But not just any beach, Ponds! A beach in space. Way better than space Florida, it’s more like — oh, I don’t know, something brilliant. The sand is millions and millions of shavings of this stone, that’s sort of like diamonds, only soft to the touch, and the water is always the perfect temperature, oh, you’ll love it. Off you pop, go get dressed.”  
  
He tries to wave them away, but River clears her throat, arms crossed over her chest, tapping her foot and glaring at him. He tugs at his collar.  
  
“Wouldn’t you rather go somewhere less… tropical?” River says.  
  
“I could do with tropical,” Rory says.  
  
“Yeah, it’s bloody cold in Leadworth in February,” Amy says, “let your parents have some sun, hm?”  
  
The Doctor nods in agreement, turning to smile at River, but her expression still makes him cringe away from her slightly. He’s been slapped by her enough to know when he’s itching to do it again.  
  
“Why don’t you want to go to the beach?” Amy says. “You loved it when you were Mels. We hopped that cheap flight one weekend, remember? Sun, sand, and _hot_ Italians.”  
  
“Okay,” Rory says, “I’m standing right here.”  
  
Amy rolls her eyes. “I did marry you, you know.”  
  
“I like the beach,” River hedges. “It’s the swimming costume I’m not keen on.”  
  
“You’ve not one day in your life been self-conscious,” Amy says, “even when you should’ve been. Spill, young lady.”  
  
River huffs. Oh, the Doctor can tell she’s just dying to slap him now.  
  
“I’m your mum,” Amy says, walking up to River and shaking her shoulders, jostling River out of her defensive posture. “You’ve got to tell me. It’s like the law.”  
  
“Don’t pull the mum card,” River says.  
  
“I can pull whatever card I want,” Amy says.  
  
River sighs and mutters something indistinguishable.  
  
“What’s that?” Rory says, peering over Amy’s shoulder.  
  
“I have a belly button piercing,” River says with a deep sigh, lifting her head to glare at the Doctor. He hopes she isn’t armed.  
  
Amy let out a bark of laughter. “Seriously? I thought that’d be gone with all of the —” she waves her hand about “— regenerating.”  
  
River shakes her head. “It looks ridiculous.”  
  
“You loved it when you were Mels,” Amy says. “Tortured poor Rory endlessly, running ‘round without a proper shirt on while he tried to cover you up with whatever prop he could find at the time. You sure you didn’t know you were her father?”  
  
“Maybe I did,” Rory says, “maybe it was intuition. Anyway, those weren’t remotely shirts.”  
  
The Doctor lurches into action, trying to derail that conversation before he has more reasons to think about his wife prancing around being young and reckless and a bit scary and wearing far too little. He drapes his arms over Amy and Rory’s shoulders, tugging them into them and grinning at his — very irritated — wife.  
  
“Now that we’ve cleared this all up,” he says, “let’s go to the beach?”  
  
Amy and Rory look to River expectantly, and she throws her hands up in defeat.  
  
“Alright,” she says, “fine, but don’t think you’re off the hook, sweetie.”  
  
River took off to the wardrobe with the Ponds as the Doctor set about finding them the proper beach, hoping that she changes into a swimsuit, if not only because she couldn’t possibly be hiding a gun somewhere on her person.  
  
  
He seriously, seriously underestimated his wife. He doesn't know why he's always doing that. He knows she's terribly clever and terribly fast and inhumanly strong and uncomfortably well-versed in all aspects of weaponry and warfare. He  _knows_ she's dangerous, not least because she's already killed him, and because she's got the short-sighted selfish sort of recklessness he doesn't allow himself; she loves her parents, she loves him depending on the day, and beyond that, anything goes. He knows all of these things and  _yet_ he consistently forgets them in favor of getting the better of her for his own amusement, only to be abruptly, aggressively reminded that although he likes to act like he's in charge of the universe, River Song is most certainly in charge of him.

The minute they settle onto the beach and set up their blanket and umbrella, Amy asks River to take a swim with her. He realizes his staggering idiocy the moment River steps out of her shorts and yanks her t-shirt over her head, giving her hair a fluff and chatting idly to Amy as Amy undresses, as though she's unaware that the Doctor is staring at her with his mouth hanging open. She's in the smallest bikini he thinks he's ever seen in a bright green that makes her skin look so delicious he lifts a hand to his mouth, briefly concerned he's drooling. It appears to be made up of two small triangles of fabric that barely cover her breasts and one triangle of fabric in the front of the bottoms that barely cover  _anything_. He can only hope there's also a triangle of fabric in the back as well, the two held together by skinny little strings she's tied into bows. If he were religious, he would've thanked whatever deity that Amy and Rory were with them, because River tended to tone it down when her parents were present — he could only imagine what she would be wearing were they alone. What has him most, transfixed, however, is the glinting belly button ring she'd put in place. It's not just a stud, but a sort of curvy golden bar topped on either end by what are probably gemstones — he'll probably be very cross about hearing where she'd acquired them — that match her suit quite well. He thinks it wouldn't have been nearly so jarring, except that she never wears anything like that, and that he's been fixating on it for so long — of course, he's fixating on it in a completely different way, now.

He starts to say something, but all that comes out is a horribly embarrassing sort of choking. Amy looks at him and rolls her eyes, wrapping an arm around River's shoulder and dragging her toward the water as River tosses him a wink over her shoulder. He's very grateful to find that there is in fact a piece of fabric in back of her swimsuit, although he's less grateful to see that it's not particularly sizeable. As she walks away, there's so much skin on display — the curve of her ribcage into her waist, and then the flare of her hips down into her pert, mostly visible —

Rory claps a hand over the Doctor's eyes.

"Thank you," the Doctor says, "that was getting to be a bit embarrassing."

" _Getting_ to be?" Rory says, sounding flustered. "It was embarrassing from the get-go, but alright. Stop staring at my daughter like she's edible."

"I have so many different responses to that, none of which I'd ever consider saying to my father-in-law."

"You'd better not say them to anybody," Rory says. Then, "except River. If she likes that sort of thing."

"She —"

"Don't bloody  _tell_ me, Doctor," Rory says, removing his hand. "I don't want the details. As long as you make my girls happy, I'll put up with you. Step out of line, though —"

The Doctor gave a salute, smiling slightly. "Your girls, eh?"

"Mine," Rory says, giving the Doctor a Very Stern Look. "But don't tell them I said it."

"'Course not," the Doctor says. He's pleased to have diffused the situation, but also very grateful that he'd taken his shirt off and dropped it into his lap, at least until Rory notices.

"Do you want me to put your shirt in the bag with everyone's clothes?" Rory asks, holding out a hand.

The Doctor flushes to his ears, lying back on the towel and covering his face with his hands. "I'd rather not."

Rory's silent for a moment. Then, "I hate you."

The Doctor doesn't really have anything sensible to say to that.

 

 

The day goes about as well as it could possibly go when the Doctor can’t stop thinking about the belly button ring. He doesn’t remember what he thought was so funny about it, because now it’s just this mind-bogglingly sexy bauble his wife is flaunting in front of him, while he’s in front of her parents, and he _really_ needs to stop forgetting how bloody resourceful his wife is when it comes to turning her disadvantages into sweeping victories.

They spend most of the day at the beach, laying on the sand and swimming and walking along the shoreline — he’s not sure whether Amy and Rory are intentionally keeping him from their daughter or if it’s River, punishing him for earlier, but he doesn’t manage to get a moment alone with her all day. All he can do is watch as she prances around in her altogether, all sleek muscles and golden skin, gleaming and slightly sticky with the saltwater, and stare stupidly at the gemstones fixed to her belly button. As the day goes on, it only gets worse — he doesn’t think he’s ever spent this much time around his wife without touching her, even when she was actively trying to kill him, and her lips and cheeks are red from the sun, and her hair is massive and especially curly from the salt and humidity, and she looks like every dream he’s ever had, even before he remembers the belly button ring and then he thinks she just might succeed in killing him a second time.

Finally, the Ponds decide they’re hungry, and they pack up their beach supplies and head to the nearest restaurant, a small dive with a patio out front that gives them an excellent view of the setting sun. The Doctor wishes he could focus on what a great day it’s been with the Ponds, and how peculiarly without crisis, but he can’t possibly when River sits down on the booth beside him, leaning back against the wall to look out at the sunset so that the light hits her like a painting; one of the thin straps of her bathing suit slide down her arm, making the triangle of fabric gap slightly. She bites her lip, her eyes filling with the sunset, and he’s not even sure she’s trying anymore, but she looks so incredible he can’t take his eyes off of her.

“It’s getting chilly,” Rory says, “pop back to the TARDIS to get some jumpers? Or a blanket?”

River smirks. “I think we’ll be alright, Dad.”

“Hush,” Rory says sternly, “it _is_ getting cold. You’ll thank me for it later, young lady.”

River laughs at him, but Rory doesn’t move to get up, staring pointedly at the Doctor. The Doctor can feel Rory’s eyes on him, but he doesn’t really want to look away from River. Amy sighs.

“Come on, stupid face,” Amy says, “we’re the adults, we’ll get the blankets.”

“But —”

“Come _on_ ,” Amy says, grabbing his arm and dragging him off of the bench. The water drops off glasses of water before disappearing back into the building to prepare their food, a fact that the Doctor’s only dimly aware of, because he hasn’t looked away from River. Finally, _finally_ she looks back, and raises a brow.

“Can I help you?”

“I thought you hated the belly button ring,” he says.

“I think I’ve seen the light,” River says, “nothing that renders you borderline incoherent for an entire day could possibly be bad.”

“I’ve not been incoherent!”

“Very nearly,” River says. “I’ve never seen a man spend so much time staring at my stomach, particularly when I’m practically topless.”

He huffs. “Well, you did it on purpose.”

“Of course I did,” she says, “I specifically asked you not to do something and you did it anyway. What kind of husband are you?”

He sighs, scrubbing a hand over her face. For all of her games, he detects an actual note of hurt to her tone, buried beneath all the archness. “I’m sorry,” he says, “I wasn’t thinking. It was inconsiderate of me. In the future, I’ll do everything you say.”

“Ooh, sweetie,” she says, “let’s go back to the TARDIS now and see how good a boy you can be.”

The Doctor feels his ears go red. “Your parents are in the TARDIS.”

“Then let’s start now,” River says, scooching down the bench until she’s pressed into his side, her thigh hot against his as she drapes the leg closest to him over his, curling her foot beneath his calf and running a hand through his hair. “I’ve been running around all day waiting for you touch me.”

“There wasn’t really an opportunity,” he says.

“Kiss me,” she says.

“Is that an order, Song?” He leans toward her, barely brushing his lips against hers and nuzzling his nose against her cheek. She hums.

“Yes,” she says, and he doesn’t need any further encouragement. He leans in to kiss her, and her lips are rough and salty against his, her tongue cooler and wetter in contrast. She moans into his mouth instantly, and he wraps an arm around her, pulling her into him as best he can without foisting her into his lap, which he figures the restaurant staff wouldn’t appreciate. Her skin is practically radiating heat, faintly burnt from a day in the sun, and it’s all bare and smooth and lightly sticky from stalt and perspiration.

They’re both still in their bathing suits, though, and so when he loses a hand in her hair and she presses herself up against him more fully, her abdomen presses against his side, and the cold metal of her belly button ring digs into his skin, and he remembers it. He pulls away from her, kissing the corner of her lips, and trailing a hand down between her breasts, over her sternum, and then over the belly button ring.

“You’re wrong, you know,” he says, “I rather fancy the piercing on you.”

River laughs low in her throat. “You and your fixations. If I could get you to spend too much time thinking about my index finger and then wore a shiny ring you’d probably lose your mind over it.”

“I’m not that easy to manipulate,” he says looking up at her briefly to glare before dropping his eyes back to the jewelry at her navel, giving it a light tug. River bites her lip.

“You so are,” she says, and he gives the ring another gentle tug in reproach, making River gasp.

It’s a wound that’s long since healed, an entire body ago, and the skin is particularly elastic he notes as he works it around, watching it slide through the piercing as he pulls it up, and the back down again. If he puts a small amount of pressure on it, just enough to be felt, it makes her squirm and bite her lip, and he thinks about doing it with his mouth — tracing his tongue over it, shifting it through the piercing with his lips, sucking it into his mouth and tugging at the skin just to the line of pain before letting it go, the metal clicking against his teeth.

“Stop talking,” River says, tugging at his hair and forcing his mouth to hers. He hadn’t even realized he’d been speaking out loud until she stops him. She lets out a low moan into his mouth, loud enough in the public place to make him blush, her fingers digging into him as she tries to draw him closer. He slid his hands around from her stomach and are seconds away from grasping her ass and pulling her onto his lap, publicness be damned, when he remembers that Amy and Rory will be returning every minute, and abruptly throws his hands into the air.

“What are you doing?” River says, pulling away from him.

“Your parents will be back any minute!”

“They know we’re married, honey,” River says, “I don’t think they’re going to be scarred. It’s only snogging.”

“You,” he says, risking touching her just long enough to bop her on the nose, “don’t know the meaning of ‘only’.”

“ _Me_!” she scoffs. “You’re the one who spent all day with your tongue hanging out while my dad repeatedly threw a frisbee at your head.”

“I thought he just had poor aim!”

River laughs. “No, definitely intentional. You weren’t exactly subtle — all that gawking and sitting with your hat in your lap. Don’t get me wrong, it was great fun for me, and I was definitely owed a little revenge, but…” she trails off, shrugging.

“It wasn’t that bad,” he says.

“It really was,” she says.

He holds her gaze, ignoring her smug smirk, before he finally sighs and relents. " _Your_ fault."

" _Your_ fault," River says. "We wouldn't be here at all if it were up to me."

"Well now you've overcome your fear, at least."

"It wasn't a fear," River says, "and I still don't like it."

" _I_ like it," the Doctor says, reaching down to run a finger over the piercing. "I do want to know where you got these stones, though. They look like —"

"Spoilers, sweetie," River says. He starts to object, but she shakes her head. "Trust me, you didn't like knowing when it was happening, you certainly don't want to know ahead of time."

He sighs, glaring at her, but he breaks into a smile after a moment. The Doctor reaches down to try and scoot her leg off of him and regain some personal space for when the Ponds return, but River clicks her tongue and stands.

"What —"

She shushes him, grabbing his hand and stepping past him to exit the booth — and he's  _very_ glad Rory isn't around to see the face he makes as she turns to the side to slip out through the small space between him and the table and all but shakes her ass in his face — and pulling him behind her as she leaves the porch of the restaurant and heads back toward the beach.

"River!" he shouts, trying to dig his heels in, but she's quite a bit stronger than he is, and he can't get traction in the sand. "Your parents will be back any minute!"

"I know," River says, "that's why I left money on the table while you were staring at my arse." He splutters, but she laughs over his denial. "More than enough to cover a lovely dinner for them, plus drinks, and then we'll join them for dessert."

"And just what will we tell them we were doing while they were eating?!"

"You'll tell my dad that you invited me for a moonlight stroll, oceanside," River says, "it'll sound very sweet and romantic and help to pave over his desire to strangle you to death at the next opportunity."

She's very clearly not planning on walking oceanside, though, he realizes as she tugs him toward a small lean-to on the beach, the sort of things life guards spend the day in until after dark. Grabbing his other hand so that he's facing her, she gives him the sort of grin that has preceded almost every single one of their many, many arrests.

"River..." he warns, "I don't think —"

"Hush," she says, leaning against the wall of the small building and tugging him sharply toward her. He stumbles against her as she loops her arms over his neck, pressing a quick kiss to his lips. "I thought I was in charge, hm?"

"What if they come looking for us?" the Doctor says, but he leans into River anyway.

"They won't," River says, "Amy knows me better than that."

"I don't want to think about that statement in this context at all."

River laughs, pausing to trail kisses down his throat, her hands dropping from around his neck now that he's relaxed into her and slowly sliding up the hem of his t-shirt. He rests his hands on her hips, although they don't rest for long — the minute he touches her skin, he can't help the slow path they begin, caressing her gently from hip to waist to shoulder. She sighs, rucking his shirt up further, and he pulls away only long enough for her to peel it off of him. He still has half a mind to protest, but when there's a mostly naked River in front of him, all warm and wanting and glowing in the soft moonlight, well, the other half of his mind quick overrules it. He leans down to kiss her, focusing on the way her tongue feels as it slides into his mouth instead of her eager hands, tugging his bathing suit down his hips, because although they should be quick, he still needs to pay proper attention to that ridiculous belly button ring. Pulling away from her and grabbing her wrists to pull her hands away from him, he steps out of his swim trunks, and sinks to his knees in front of River; he has to admit, for all of his problems with her ridiculous, clandestine plan, the sand makes kneeling in front of her quite comfortable. He kisses her stomach, his hands spanning the outsides of her thighs as he kisses his way to the top of her bikini bottoms, grazing over her belly button ring with his teeth only briefly.

"Sweetie," she breathes, reaching a hand down to run through his hair as he hooks his thumbs in her bikini bottoms and tugs them down, helping her to step out of them. He kisses the inside of her right thigh as he tosses them aside, then the left, further up. She bites her lip.

"Top too," he says.

She raises her brows. "Forward of you."

"If we get caught," he says, "I'm not going to be the only one running naked down the beach."

She snorts, arching her back to reach behind her and untie the knot that holds her top up, and then the one behind her neck. She drops the top to the sand beside them, looking more than a little smug as he just stares at her, his mouth run dry. River's always stunning, but flushed from a day in the sun, her skin still sticky and salty and glinting in the moonlight, she's beyond words. She gives his hair a little tug after a moment.

"Back to work, then," she says.

"Sorry, Doctor," he says, reaching his hands up between her legs to spread them slightly, leaning forward to press a quick, noncommittal kiss to her center.

"It's alright, Doctor," she says back, letting out a brief chuckle that turns into a gasp as he leans in again to run his tongue along her folds, flicking it over her clit. 

He begins in earnest, then, using his lips and tongue and just the barest brush of his teeth to tease her until her hand is tight in his hair and she slings one left over his shoulder, pulling him to her as he thrusts his tongue as deep within her as he can, burying his face between her legs; she tastes sharp and bright, and the feel of her strong leg trembling where it rests against his shoulder makes him ache. He reaches one hand up to press his thumb to her clit as he continues to stroke her inner walls with his tongue, over and over, as his thumb swipes over the little bundle of nerves until she's practically singing for him. Right when he can feel her body tensing up, ready for release, he pulls away, gripping her hips to keep her still and ignoring the profanities she aims at him to kiss his way up from between her legs to her navel with an open mouth until he can toy with the bauble she has there with his tongue.

 She inhales sharply, the stream of colorful language coming to an abrupt halt as he pulls the belly button ring between his teeth, tugging it away from her and stretching the skin until he nails dig into his scalp and he released it, and returned to tracing around her belly button with his tongue, clanking his teeth over the metal, nipping gently and not so gently at the surrounding skin until she was gasping all over again, squirming against him where he held her still. He could've done that forever; after a moment, though, she moans as he tales the bauble in his mouth again and tugs him up by his hair.

"You're such a  _tease_ ," she manages before he collapses into her, kissing her soundly, loosing his hands in her hair. She lifts one leg over his hip and he hikes it up further with one hand under her thigh, pressing up against her wet core as she moans.

"Takes one to know one," he says, hitching her leg up further on his hip as she reaches between them to wrap a hand around his hard length. 

"You started it," she says.

"Did I?" he asks, not quite sure if it's true or not, even if he is able to grab onto his thoughts long enough to figure it out. She kisses him again as he steadies himself with one hand against the wall and the other beneath her leg before pushing into her — he plans to go slowly, but the sound she makes is positively obscene, and he ends up thrusting into her hard and fast, not that she ever minds.

She pants encouragement into his ear as he presses her tight up against the wall, pulling out of her and thrusting back in again, setting a hard and fast rhythm. She's already worked up, her muscles clutching around him even as he feels himself building up to the peak. If he cants his hips just right on the down stroke, he presses up against her clit and can feel the smooth, cool metal of her belly button ring against him, and when he gets it just right it makes his whole body hot.

"Just like that," she encourages, and so he resettles his hand under her leg and pushes into her harder and harder, and each stroke is met with the swell of her muscles and her gasp against his cheek and the cool feel of metal against his abdomen and her hands scraping at his back and after an entire day of fantasizing about River and her belly button ring, it's  _impossibly_ good. He turns his head to kiss her again, wet and warm and just enough teeth to let him know that she's desperate, that she's close. He lets his hand fall from the wall and instead slides it up the back of her planted leg, hitching it up over his hip as well so that he's holding her up, and she gasps in surprise. The new angle is deeper and better and just a little bit dangerous as they stumble slightly to the side, and he steadies them at the last minute, moaning as she comes apart around him on a long, loud moan that hits him bone deep, and he follows after her.

They only barely manage to stay standing, and he slowly releases her legs until she's standing on her own again — or rather, leaning against the wall — and even though he can hardly catch his breath, he kisses her, because she looks sunburned and her hair's mussed and her eyelids are heavy and she looks so sexy and satisfied that he can't help it.

"Still cross about the beach trip?" he asks, when they pull apart.

"Yes," she says, grinning when he pouts. "But I've forgiven you even so."

"Fine," he says, still pouting a bit as he steps away from her to set about picking up their clothing.

He hands her her swimsuit, reaching for his own as they dress, sparing a moment here and there for a quick kiss. Once they're dressed, she grabs his hand and starts to drag him back up to the restaurant.

"We look like we've been shagging," he says, eying the sand that sticks to her bathing suit and the enormous size of her hair.

"We _have_ been shagging."

"Yes, but I don't want your  _parents_ to know that."

"Don't worry your pretty little head," River says, tossing a smirk over her shoulder that — stupidly — disarms him. "I'm sure they've barely gotten back themselves."

"Wh —"

"What do you think  _they_ took to the TARDIS for, hm?"

" _River!"_ he shouts, pulling his hand from hers and clapping both over his ears. "I don't want to know that!"

River laughs, turning around to loop an arm through his at the elbow and continue pulling him along. He's not sure if she hopes she's right, so they can't judge, or if he hopes she's wrong, so he never ever has to think about that, ever again.


End file.
